The Orphan's Tale

by Pam Jenoff

  Then it is over and the audience offers a smattering of applause. Time to go—at last. I make my way from the big top and cross the backyard to the cabin where Theo and Elsie, who is supposed to be watching him, both sleep. I change into street clothes before picking up the bag that Astrid had packed. I lift Theo, who stirs and watches me with drowsy eyes, onto my other hip. “Time to go,” I whisper to him before starting from the cabin.

  As I cross the backyard, I spot Astrid once more. She waves me over. For a fleeting second, I hope that our performing together might have softened her anger. But as I near, her eyes still burn. She snatches Theo from me. “This I shall miss,” she says, clutching him to her breast.

  “Astrid...” I search for the words to make things better between us, but find none.

  “Just go,” she commands as she passes Theo back to me. He gives a single cry of protest. “At least I will never have to see you again.” Her words are like a knife, and as she turns and walks away I know there will be no more goodbyes.

  I start after her. I can’t bear to go with Astrid furious at me. But there is no choice. I told Luc I would meet him at nine o’clock, just fifteen minutes from now. I have to find him.

  From the tent comes the boom of the music. Emmet’s voice warbles over the loudspeaker, so far short of what his father’s had been. I look back with gratitude. The circus has been my haven—my safety and my home, in a way I had never expected. Even now, when it is broken and near the end, the circus is the truest family I know. Once I leave, what hope is there of ever feeling this way again?

  Then I square my shoulders as I start away with Theo. What will he remember of all this? I force myself not to linger as I pass the train cars. I run low so as not to be seen, taking care not to jostle Theo too hard. Faster, I hear Astrid urge in my mind as I pick up speed, heading east in the direction Luc had said. I wish for the shelter of trees, but the earth here is barren and exposed. Someone might see us at any moment, ask why I am fleeing. I will myself to slow, walk normally as I struggle to catch my breath.

  As I start toward the quarry and the laughter and applause of the crowd fade behind me, my doubts about leaving bubble once more. How can we possibly survive, the two of us with a child and nothing more? I push my misgivings aside. I want to go with Luc. I see the image of a life together that he promised. Despite my fears, there would be two of us, united in our struggle for our survival and Theo’s. Without him, I would be alone—again.

  We are well away from the circus now and the earth grows rocky, slopes sharply downward. I clutch Theo tightly, navigating the steep slope. The path I’ve followed ends at what appears to be a pit of roughly cut stone. Luc said he would be there at intermission, waiting for me.

  But the quarry is empty.

  It is early, I tell myself, pushing down my unease. I search the brush that shoots out between the rocks at the far end of the quarry, wondering if he is hiding. The branches remain motionless, though, the air still.

  Five minutes pass, then ten. Luc is still not here. A list of excuses runs through my mind: he got lost, he had to double back to make sure he wasn’t followed. Maybe he had become ill. Theo, tired or perhaps hungry, begins to fuss. “Shh,” I soothe, fishing in my pocket for a piece of cracker I’d left there earlier. “Just a little longer.”

  I look over the edge of the quarry pit, across the flat, empty field. Dread forms and sinks heavy in my stomach. Luc is not coming.

  How is this happening? Our plans were certain. Panic fills me. Maybe something had happened to Luc. I see his face just hours earlier. He had asked, no begged, me to go with him—and he had seemed so happy when I said yes. Had he changed his mind and decided that having me and Theo along was too much? Or maybe Astrid had been right all along. I stand still in the cold, dark quarry, tears stinging at my eyes—foolish and abandoned yet again.

  Something brushes my cheek then. Theo is looking up at me, his soft fingers reaching out to me as they had in the woods the night I had taken him from the boxcar. Bits of that night come back in flashes: a small fist clenched stiffly, never to be opened again, arms reaching for a mother no longer there. Images I cannot bear to keep in the light of day. A sob tears through me. I had not cried when my father held open the door and forced me out into the cold with nothing more than my purse. Nor when I’d seen the railcar of stolen infants, dead and dying. Now the tears race forth and I am grieving for all of it. I press my hands to my eyes, willing the visions to stop. It is hopeless—I will carry that night at the train car with me forever. Saving Theo had been not just for him—it had been my chance at redemption.

  Maybe it still is. I see Astrid standing before me, holding out a ticket to freedom. She is so angry that I don’t know if she would give it to me now. And there is some part of me that does not want to take the pass, her only chance at survival. But I owe it to Theo to try.

  I look up at the sky. You are never going back, Astrid said once. She is right. I can no more count on Luc than on my family for salvation. Instead, I will get us to a place where Theo will be safe, and a day at the circus would not be taken from him just because he is a Jew, where people would not stare at him oddly. It isn’t Luc, or even my parents I am looking for anymore. It is a home of my own.

  I peer over my shoulder in the direction of the big top. If I go back now and join the final bow, no one but Astrid will realize that I have gone. I can ask her for the pass after the show. I shift Theo to my other hip. He cries openly now, his wails cutting through the darkness as I navigate the steep slope out of the quarry.

  “Shh,” I soothe. I take one last hopeful look over my shoulder in the direction from which Luc should have come. Seeing no one, I turn and start back to the circus.

  I near the big top once more. Then remembering the anger on Astrid’s face as I left earlier, I slow. What can I possibly say to make her forgive me? As I reach the backyard, I hear the music of the final act trumpeting gaily, building to a fever pitch. The circus is assembling for the final bow. Through the tent flap I see the place where I usually stand at the top of the board, and I imagine the confused face of Gerda, who is normally beside me, wondering where I have gone. Longing fills me to go where I belong, amid the circus family one last time. And even though I am sad Luc did not come and we will be leaving again soon, part of me cannot help but feel glad to be home.

  But as I draw close to the circus tent, my happiness fades. There is a strange smell in the air, like someone overcooked the caramel corn, only stronger. Something tickles at my nose then—a burning smell. There is a fire—and close. I think back to the air raid we’d heard during our act. No bombs had hit nearby, but perhaps there had been stray shrapnel or even a cigarette thrown carelessly on the midway. Is it the big top? We have always taken such great precautions against fire. Looking up, I see something flickering in the cloth by the hauptmast: a flame, growing larger even as I watch. Nobody, not anyone among the remaining crowds that linger in the tent nor the performers making their way to the backyard, seems to have noticed yet. No one except me.

  I clutch Theo tighter and break into a dead run.

  26

  Astrid

  I stand on the board above the circus ring. Alone, once more.

  After Noa had gone, I climbed to the board. Good riddance, I wanted to say as I imagined her leaving. Instead I found myself aching with loss. Still it was not Noa whom I cursed in that moment, but me. How I hated myself for caring yet again! It was Erich abandoning me all over. I remembered the lesson I had learned the day I left Berlin, seared it into my brain now as I should have long ago: the only one I could rely on in this life was me.

  It is just as well, I think now. With Noa leaving, I am free to use the pass to go to my brother. After the final bow, I will slip away before anyone notices. Pushing thoughts of Noa and Theo aside, I instead focus on Jules, who is waiting for me.

 
My cue comes in the music and I unfasten the ropes from their moorings. Emmet had told me at the last minute that he added the Spanish web routine back into the second act. It was only then that I noticed the new ropes, hastily installed where the clockmaker had hung just days earlier. I wanted to protest. It wasn’t that I was sentimental about Metz. Rather, I hadn’t rehearsed it in weeks and the trapeze alone would be exhausting enough. But I didn’t want to give Emmet cause to fight—after all, it was to be the last show before I slipped away forever.

  I wrap the ropes around myself and step from the board. There is no bar to hold tight, just two thin slips of satin. I spin around them, extend my leg. If flying trapeze is like gymnastics as I once told Noa, then Spanish web is like swimming, seamless and graceful. Or at least they once were; now my arms are weak from weeks of not training and my movements are jerky. I struggle through the routine. But the audience does not seem to notice.

  I make my way back to the board as applause thunders, my body bathed in sweat. I do not climb down. My act is just before the finale and I need to remain here for the final bow. As the elephants prance, interspersed with riders on horseback, there is a yell from below. “Fire!” someone calls. I see it then, a flicker of flames behind one of the bleachers, growing higher by the second. The flames are only on one side of the tent. If everyone evacuates to the far exit, it will be fine. We have done drills for fire before. Herr Neuhoff or Peter, if either was here, would have urged calm.

  “Fire!” a woman screams again and everyone begins to run, crushing one another as they flee the stands, falling. Spectators in the first few rows flood into the ring, panicking the elephants and sending them charging.

  I look frantically at the nightmare that is unfolding below. The entire top of the tent burns now. Once the workers would have grabbed the buckets of sand and water, always placed by each pole with such care, and fought to save the big top. But they are almost all gone now, dismissed by Emmet. A strongman tosses sand and then flings the bucket before running in the other direction. The trainers try to save the elephants, coaxing them from the tent. But the beasts fight rescue, planting their feet in panic, and the trainers flee, every creature for itself. The tiger lies motionless on its side, overcome by smoke. What would the circus be without it? Against the burning sky, I see the dark shadow of Emmet fleeing, a coward until the end.

  I stand immobilized on the board, watching the scene below as if from a great distance or in a film. But the heat, growing uncomfortable against my skin, reminds me that it is real. I remember how earlier, before I received Jules’s letter, I wanted to die. If I do nothing it will all be over. Would that be so awful? I feel Jules and a life in America slipping away like a dream.

  No, I shake my head, clearing it. My brother is waiting for me. I have to get out. I start for the ladder. But as I begin to climb down, one of the elephants spins, knocking against the ladder and loosening it from its moorings. It sways precariously. I cling to the rungs as the ladder starts to pull out. It lists to one side, threatening to fall at any second.

  I look around desperately. The bar for the catch trap is a few feet above me, almost out of reach. I lunge out, clawing at it with one hand. My fingers wrap around the bar. What now? There are too many people below, scurrying under the net, for me to drop safely. I eye the far board, then kick my feet hard to try to swing up to it. But it is too far away, no use.

  I hang helplessly, smoke filling my lungs and causing my eyes to burn. My arms, already exhausted from the show, throb with pain. I must hold on. A few more minutes and there won’t be anyone below me to injure when I fall. But it will be too late—the net below burns now, making a safe landing impossible.

  “Astrid!” a voice calls through the smoky haze. Noa. She stands at the entrance to the big top. Why had she come back? She starts toward me with wide, desperate eyes. “Astrid, hold on!” She looks down at Theo, who squirms in her arms, then up to me, uncertain what to do. I see her hold out Theo to one of the dancers, begging her to take him outside away from the smoke and searing heat. But the dancer panics and flees, leaving the child behind. Noa starts toward the far ladder, still holding Theo.

  “Get out!” I cry. What is she thinking, risking the child and herself like that? But she continues climbing. At the top, she sets Theo down as far back as she possibly can so he will not roll off and secures the edge of his blanket to the board. Then she grabs the bar and leaps, looking out of place in her street clothes.

  “Astrid, reach for me,” she calls as she swings close. I do not let go. She has never caught in her life. She cannot possibly manage it. “Astrid, we have to get out.” Noa saving me is the last thing I want right now. “Peter would want you to fight,” she adds. “Don’t give up like this.”

  “Peter is gone,” I say numbly.

  “I know. But we’re here. And if you don’t let go we will all die—even Theo. Astrid, you have to let go.” Her words, an echo of mine to her when she first came to the show, are true. Desperately I spin and wrap my legs around the bar, stretching my arms toward her. I give a swing and reach out to her. She misses and I try again.

  Our hands lock and a look of triumph forms in her eyes. “I’ve got you,” she says, but I do not return the smile. This changes nothing.

  “Just get us back,” I order. But how? She cannot possibly swing me back to the perch. “There,” I say, pointing to a corner of the net, close to the ladder, where there is no fire. “Throw me in that direction.”

  “You want me to drop you?” Her eyes are wide with disbelief.

  “There’s no other choice. Aim for the corner and fling hard.” She looks down uncertainly. “You have to do it now.” In another few minutes the rest of the net will be in flames, my one chance at escape gone. “You have to let go.” She takes a deep breath and kicks her legs to gain momentum and swing us closer in that direction. I hold my breath. Noa has never been a catcher or thrown anyone in her entire life. But she releases me then and her aim is good. I sail smoothly downward, body taut and knees soft, and land in the bit of the net that is intact, just by the edge.

  I look back up at the trapeze where Noa still hangs, wishing I could tell her to jump, too. But Theo is still up on the perch. “Quickly!” I cry. She swings herself back higher, desperate to reach the board. She slips, nearly falling. But her fingers grasp the edge and she pulls herself up onto it.

  Noa picks up Theo and starts down the ladder. But her movements are slow and awkward as she tries to climb while holding the child who, hysterical with terror, screams and flails in her arms.

  “Here!” I cry, racing to the bottom of the ladder.

  “Take him,” she shouts, dropping Theo to me, almost throwing him. He lands in my arms with a solid thump, bawling louder. I cover Theo’s nose and mouth. I have to get him out of here. A man trying to flee the tent slams into me, sending waves of pain through my shoulder. I cling harder to Theo so as not to drop him. I look at the open door where cool fresh air beckons against the fullness in my lungs.

  Overhead there is a creaking sound, which grows to a groan. “Get out!” someone screams, pushing me toward the exit. Then I turn back. Noa is still struggling to get to the ground, but she is too high for me to reach her.

  The entire ladder begins to sway, listing hard in one direction. There is a thunderous crashing and the trapeze apparatus begins to come down above me. The chapiteau has been weakened by the flames and the whole thing is starting to collapse.

  I slip through the tent flap clutching Theo. With a deafening crash, the big top falls, raining fire down. And Noa disappears from sight.

  27

  Noa

  Theo is missing.

  I reach for him frantically in the darkness. But my arms close around nothing, as they had that night I tried to reach him on the roof of the rail station. He is gone.

  “Theo!” I cry over and over
. There is no response.

  “Here he is.” Astrid. She sounds so far away. I try to open my eyes, but glass shards grind at my face and I can manage only a slit. Enough to see Theo, whom she has placed on top of me. He is here, but I cannot feel him through the searing pain, worse than a thousand bee stings.

  I am lying on the ground, some fifteen feet from the big top. How had I gotten here? In the distance, what is left of the chapiteau smolders, reduced to a pile of charred canvas and broken poles. The fire brigade, too late, waters the wreckage so it does not spark and catch fire to the parched nearby forest.

  I reach for Theo, but Astrid presses me back down gently. “No,” I manage hoarsely. “I must.” She moves him higher on my chest without letting go. “Is he all right?”

  “Perfectly fine,” she assures me. I search the child to see if the smoke had harmed his tiny lungs. He gives one cough, a protest. His coloring is good, though, his eyes bright.

  Then I lie back, unable to hold my head up any longer.

  “Rest,” Astrid urges and as she pulls Theo back, I can see there are burn marks on her arms.

  “What happened?” I ask. She hesitates, as if not wanting to tell me. “I’m not a child, remember? No more hiding the truth.”

  “The tent collapsed on top of you,” she answers quietly.

  I relive the moment in my mind, feel her pulling me from the fiery wreckage falling upon me and crushing me to the earth. “I can’t feel my legs,” I say, gasping for air. There is a sharp pain as I breathe inward, then a spasm of coughs shoots daggers through me.

  Astrid wipes my mouth with her sleeve and when she pulls back it is stained with red. Panic crosses her face and she looks around desperately. “Medic!” she cries and I can tell from her cracked voice that it is not the first time she has tried to get me help.